Just when I thought I was out, they sucked me back in!

[Canadave]

I fucking love X-COM. Well, the first two games. Apocalypse is dead to me.

I've never played either of the sequels. I recall hearing that Terror from the Deep (or whatever the hell it was called) was pretty much the exact same thing. True? What was the problem with Apocalypse?

I'd kill for a turn-based squad combat game with modern graphics along the lines of X-COM

TFTD was similar, but harder. They swapped out the graphics and amped the difficulty.

Which is why I've never played it. I can't even survive more than a few missions in the original game...

Pulling out older games happens to me a lot. To name just a few:

Homeworld
SimCity 4
Tom Landry's Strategy Football
Space Quest III

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I've never played either of the sequels. I recall hearing that Terror from the Deep (or whatever the hell it was called) was pretty much the exact same thing. True? What was the problem with Apocalypse?

I'd kill for a turn-based squad combat game with modern graphics along the lines of X-COM

TFTD was similar, but harder. They swapped out the graphics and amped the difficulty.

Which is why I've never played it. I can't even survive more than a few missions in the original game...

Pulling out older games happens to me a lot. To name just a few:

Homeworld
SimCity 4
Tom Landry's Strategy Football
Space Quest III

Oh, don't get me started on Homeworld. One of my favorite games of all time. Can't ever shut up about it.

My personal Space Quest favorite is 4, with 5 right behind. 3 was okay.

My favorite Sierra series is Quest for Glory, though, with 4 being the one I love to go back and replay.

 

[Canadave]

TFTD was similar, but harder. They swapped out the graphics and amped the difficulty.

Which is why I've never played it. I can't even survive more than a few missions in the original game...

Pulling out older games happens to me a lot. To name just a few:

Homeworld
SimCity 4
Tom Landry's Strategy Football
Space Quest III

Oh, don't get me started on Homeworld. One of my favorite games of all time. Can't ever shut up about it.

My personal Space Quest favorite is 4, with 5 right behind. 3 was okay.

I'm the same on Homeworld. It's an absolutely brilliant game, and one that I think is rather underappreciated.

I've always loved SQIII, myself. I think it's probably because it was the first SQ game I ever played, way back in the day. It's also got a pretty decent parser, which I actually prefer in some ways to the SQIV+ point and click interface.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Which is why I've never played it. I can't even survive more than a few missions in the original game...

Pulling out older games happens to me a lot. To name just a few:

Homeworld
SimCity 4
Tom Landry's Strategy Football
Space Quest III

Oh, don't get me started on Homeworld. One of my favorite games of all time. Can't ever shut up about it.

My personal Space Quest favorite is 4, with 5 right behind. 3 was okay.

I'm the same on Homeworld. It's an absolutely brilliant game, and one that I think is rather underappreciated.

I've always loved SQIII, myself. I think it's probably because it was the first SQ game I ever played, way back in the day. It's also got a pretty decent parser, which I actually prefer in some ways to the SQIV+ point and click interface.

See, a lot of people are purists about the old adventure games, preferring the ones with text parsers to the point-and-click variety. To me, though, the parser added an artificial difficulty to the game. You had to guess the right combination of words to do what you want, and really, what the hell does that have to do with adventuring? This is a game, not a linguistics lesson!

That said, there are some pretty good parsers today. The one in HTML Tads isn't too bad. But when your engine is focused specifically on interactive fiction, you'd be screwed without a good parser, I suppose.

 

[TheBrew]

What about code wheels? Some of the old D&D games had those. I have the wheels sitting on my bookshelf right now, in case I want to play Hillsfar or something.

You ever play King's Quest V? The copy protection for that game was a map in the manual that you needed to cross the desert without dying of thirst... and you needed a plastic red filter to read it.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

What about code wheels? Some of the old D&D games had those. I have the wheels sitting on my bookshelf right now, in case I want to play Hillsfar or something.

You ever play King's Quest V? The copy protection for that game was a map in the manual that you needed to cross the desert without dying of thirst... and you needed a plastic red filter to read it.

Oh crap. I have that game on a CD. I hope the manual is on there, too, or that they've removed the copy protection, assuming I ever get that far.

One of my favorite copy protection systems was for Microprose's F-19 Stealth Fighter. You had to correctly identify an aircraft, and all the aircraft were in the manual. Being an Air Force brat, I knew what they all were anyway.

 

[TheBrew]

You can probably look up a map online nowadays anyways. I think I did when I replayed it a few years ago. You can also get around it by brute force, though that could be annoying.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Yeah, I'm sure I could work around it. Those systems were all so silly. Starflight II made you enter the proper coordinates for a particular solar system. I think Star Trek 25th Anniversary did something similar, too. In fact, the whole "enter coordinates for this location using the included map" convention seemed to be used a lot!

 

[TheBrew]

Yeah, Judgement Rites did that too. Man, I miss the voiced adventure games of the 90s...

 

[ThunderAeroI]

Old favs:

Aces over europe/pacific
Colonization
MOO
Civ II/III
Stunt Pilot
FireHawk
Falcon 3.0
Rail Road Tycoon
Space Quest ? (can't recall version number... I recal TARA BOOM GA and Chuck Yolks egg flight simulator, Monocrome boys, etc.).
Iron Man Stewarts Offroad
Sim City (used deep red paper/black text for copy protection)
Castle I/II (best manual EVER)
Birds of Prey (most annoying copy protection)
The Dig (who couldn't love that)
Full Throttle (another classic)

 

[D Man]

Any of the Escape Velocity games from Ambrosia top this list for me easily. My favorite will always be Override, which I think had the coolest universe and most interesting stories to tell. Stuff like the mysterious Council Station orbiting a planet marked by ancient craters of war just pulls me in relentlessly. Nova is really great too, but some of the changes to the basic game engine make it kind of annoying. I always have to play it with caps lock on or it's just waaaay too slow doing anything at all.

Plus on all 3 of them, the myriad of plug-ins available extends their life almost infinitely. I play the hell out of them maybe once a year for a week or two. And on these boards, every time I see Lindley's signature about his Firefly plug-in for Nova I think "sounds awesome, can't wait."

 

[Lindley]

I'm working on it, I'm working on it.....

 

[Showdown]

There a few older games that I loved years ago, played to death and abandoned, but still get sucked back into every once in a while. Some little (often only slightly related) thing will remind me of a game and I will be filled with an overwhelming desire to play it again. I'll usually play it non-stop for a week or two and then return it to the dustbin of my subconscious, only for it to rear its ugly head again a year or two down the road.

Common offenders for me: X-COM: UFO Defense (also known as UFO: Enemy Unknown), Sid Meier's Colonization and SM's Pirates. I'm sure more will come to mind shortly, to the detriment of my social life.

Are there any games which have a similar effect on you? At the moment I am feverishly attempting to beat UFO on Superhuman difficulty, which would be a first for me.

Street Fighter series

 

[Colonel Green]

Old favs:

Aces over europe/pacific
Colonization
MOO
Civ II/III
Stunt Pilot
FireHawk
Falcon 3.0
Rail Road Tycoon
Space Quest ? (can't recall version number... I recal TARA BOOM GA and Chuck Yolks egg flight simulator, Monocrome boys, etc.).
Iron Man Stewarts Offroad
Sim City (used deep red paper/black text for copy protection)
Castle I/II (best manual EVER)
Birds of Prey (most annoying copy protection)
The Dig (who couldn't love that)
Full Throttle (another classic)

Good to see another Colonization fan, I thought I was the only one.

Which is why I've never played it. I can't even survive more than a few missions in the original game...

I was having a lot of trouble this time out, but I have recently discovered that grenade spamming is the key to sucess on early missions.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

The Knights of the old Republic games do that to me everynow and then.

Damn you for reminding me! Where's my copy of Part 1 again?

 

[Canadave]

Oh, don't get me started on Homeworld. One of my favorite games of all time. Can't ever shut up about it.

My personal Space Quest favorite is 4, with 5 right behind. 3 was okay.

I'm the same on Homeworld. It's an absolutely brilliant game, and one that I think is rather underappreciated.

I've always loved SQIII, myself. I think it's probably because it was the first SQ game I ever played, way back in the day. It's also got a pretty decent parser, which I actually prefer in some ways to the SQIV+ point and click interface.

See, a lot of people are purists about the old adventure games, preferring the ones with text parsers to the point-and-click variety. To me, though, the parser added an artificial difficulty to the game. You had to guess the right combination of words to do what you want, and really, what the hell does that have to do with adventuring? This is a game, not a linguistics lesson!

That said, there are some pretty good parsers today. The one in HTML Tads isn't too bad. But when your engine is focused specifically on interactive fiction, you'd be screwed without a good parser, I suppose.

I can see your point about parsers, but a lot of the later ones (like SQIII, again) I thought were really good at figuring out what you meant, and had a pretty extensive vocabulary. And given that the alternative leads to pixel hunting...

Colonel, I'll have to try that next time I try playing X-Com. Though really, I think the problem is I just suck at squad-based tactical strategy... I'm much better at managing a grand campaign.

 

[Colonel Green]

Colonel, I'll have to try that next time I try playing X-Com. Though really, I think the problem is I just suck at squad-based tactical strategy... I'm much better at managing a grand campaign.

Make sure to put them in your troops hands before you land, then prime them to 0 turns right away. Send troops in waves.

You'll lose a few guys due to dead men dropping live grenades, but it's for a good cause

 

[Adagio]

I keep getting sucked into Heroes of Might and Magic. I only have the first three games, but I have all the expansion packs. Addictive little bugger.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I have the second one, plus the expansion. Bought it at Goodwill for like $2. I love it.

 

[Adagio]

I have the second one, plus the expansion. Bought it at Goodwill for like $2. I love it.

Good choice!